Amagic art box that's bursting with as many materials as you could imagine. Hundreds
of different textured papers, felt tips in whatever size you want in whatever
colour you want (including dirty ones!) artist's pastels, chalk and charcoal,
pencils--coloured and any softness of lead. Oil paints-thick loaded, gesso, turpsy,
pallet knife. Watercolours--any colour, thin and crisp or thick and
dribbley. Cant afford an air brush--well here there is everything to suit your
demands in rainbows of colour. How about some tracing paper with the photo under
it ready to copy with some wax crayons-and maybe put some special effects on
your photos. I'm not going on about it any further (oh alright I will) What is
this total art studio,, well you'll never get your hands dirty and you don't have
to clean up your mess after, hmm you might have guessed. Painter by Corel,
is a natural media art programme that does as much as you would like it to do and
more. I've been using it many years since vers2 on the Mac, when it was made
by Fractal Designs and its now at vers9, and very sophisticated it has become.
I find a Wacom a graphics tablet indispensable with this as it allows you to draw/paint/scribble
as you would normally. I really cant begin to describe all the
amazing feats you can achieve, and I'm always learning something new in it.
I didn't tell you that it has an animation studio attached as well--not even looked
at that yet. I'm sorry if I sound like a sales person, but I have had immense
fun with this and thought, as so many people are becoming interested in Photoshop,
it would be naughty to keep this cool bag of tricks to myself. I created
these artworks for Shauna's grunge atcs in Painter (I have vers 6 for the
pc), so thought I would show them at their larger size. Using a punky type portrait
to begin with I set about using brushes of bright colours, texturing with
some stitch brushes, crayons, rubbers and whatever else I happened to click
on. Layers are also an important part of Painter and are compatible with Photoshop.
They can be used to create effects with composite methods like pseudocolor
and magic combine, extremely unusual or subtly enhanced. As I have worked
with this prog for so long it becomes second nature, and can be used quite intuitively.
The more its used the more you understand it--so yes it can all seem
a bit overwhelming at first. There is of course a large heavy manual to
explain it all, but if you just try a few things at a time and build on your experiences--you
can master it, and enjoy to its full potential. I always regard
what I do here as totally experimental-always improving and discovering new ways
of using it. And apart from purchase price, (which when I last checked was surprising
cheap in the US) the unlimited supply of paper and materials, and space
to keep them all in order, has helped save a few pennies and allowed free expression
without the usual waste. So I really haven't touched the surface of describing
all the wonders contained in my magic art box, but I hope that one day
you will find them for yourself Corel Painter more info etc
oh and I forgot to mention the inspiration for these works,comes about by listening
(and dancing to particularily at the clubs, when my husband allows me)
to my all time favourite DJ Lisa Lashes Yayyyy!!!!!who mixed 'Lashed', where from I nicked some of the titles as I couldnt
think up my own--blank blank